2270 Les Miserables
work, ivory bon-bon boxes ornamented with microscopic
battles, gewgaws and ribbons— he lavished everything on
Cosette. Cosette, amazed, desperately in love with Mar-
ius, and wild with gratitude towards M. Gillenormand,
dreamed of a happiness without limit clothed in satin and
velvet. Her wedding basket seemed to her to be upheld by
seraphim. Her soul flew out into the azure depths, with
wings of Mechlin lace.
The intoxication of the lovers was only equalled, as we
have already said, by the ecstasy of the grandfather. A sort
of flourish of trumpets went on in the Rue des Filles-du-
Calvaire.
Every morning, a fresh offering of bric-a-brac from the
grandfather to Cosette. All possible knickknacks glittered
around her.
One day Marius, who was fond of talking gravely in the
midst of his bliss, said, apropos of I know not what inci-
dent:
‘The men of the revolution are so great, that they have
the prestige of the ages, like Cato and like Phocion, and each
one of them seems to me an antique memory.’
‘Moire antique!’ exclaimed the old gentleman. ‘Thanks,
Marius. That is precisely the idea of which I was in search.’
And on the following day, a magnificent dress of tea-rose
colored moire antique was added to Cosette’s wedding pres-
ents.
From these fripperies, the grandfather extracted a bit of
wisdom.
‘Love is all very well; but there must be something else